2 Men Charged with Manslaughter in Chiefs Fans' Deaths 14 Months After 3 Victims Were Found in Backyard

Mar. 15, 2025

Over a year afterRicky Johnson, David Harrington and Clayton McGeeney were found deadoutside a Kansas City home days after watching a Chiefs football game, two suspects have been arrested and charged.

“After an investigation of nearly 14 months, two suspects are now facing felony charges in Platte County, including involuntary manslaughter, related to the deaths of three Chiefs fans in January of 2024,” the Kansas City Missouri Police Department said in anupdateon Wednesday, March 5.

Platte County Prosecutor Eric Zahnd said during a press conference that the suspects, identified as Jordan Willis and Ivory Carson, were charged with “distribution of a controlled substance and three counts of involuntary manslaughter.” Willis and Carson are being held on $100,000 cash bond, per theAssociated Press.

Each charge carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison. The Kansas City Police Department confirmed the arrests with PEOPLE.

“The probable cause statement alleges that Mr. Willis was determined to be the major contributor of DNA found on that bag,” said Zahnd. “The other bag contained fentanyl and the probable cause statement alleges that Mr. Carson was determined to be the major contributor of DNA on that bag.”

David Harrington, Clayton McGeeney and Ricky Johnson.Ricky Johnson/Facebook

Ricky Johnson/Facebook

Another witness allegedly claimed that he was with the three friends at Willis' home later that night, “where they drank, smoked marijuana and used cocaine. That witness left shortly before midnight.”

According to Zahnd, text messages also allegedly indicate that “Mr. Carson supplied Mr. Harrington with cocaine.”

The prosecutor said that a forensic exam determined that the three friends “all died of Fentanyl and cocaine combined toxicity.”

PEOPLE reached out to the Platte County Prosecutor’s Office for comment.

Johnson, Harrington and McGeeney were found dead on Jan. 9, 2024, two days after they went to the rental home of their friend, Willis, to watch the Kansas City Chiefs-Los Angeles Chargers game.

Picerno added that his client was “unaware of how his friends died,” and he was “anxiously awaiting the results of the autopsy and toxicology report.”

A woman searching for her fiancé, McGeeney, discovered one of the men on Willis’ back porch. The bodies of the two other men were then found in the backyard, the Kansas City Police Department told PEOPLE in a previous statement.

Two of the victims’ cars were parked on the street, but Picerno said at the time it wasn’t unusual for Willis’ friends to have left their cars overnight.

“On behalf of Jordan and his family, we wish to express our deepest sympathies to the friends and family members of these young men, and our thoughts and prayers are with them,” Picerno said in a 2024 statement released.

Throughout the investigation early last year, police repeatedly said"no foul play" had been “observed or suspected.”

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Johnson’s brother, Jonathan Price, previously told PEOPLE that he believed “something had to have been in their system” that wasn’t alcohol.“If I were to give a hypothesis… for the three men to die in the way that they did, something had to have been in their system," Price, who shares a mom with Johnson, said during an interview in January. “Whether or not it was taken knowingly, I wouldn’t answer that.”

On Feb. 1, 2024, early toxicology reports reportedly indicated the men had cocaine and fentanyl in their systems, perWDAFandTMZ, citing sources.

Althoughrumors continued to circulatein the wake of the reports, on Feb. 3, 2024, a KCPD spokesperson reiterated to PEOPLE that the case remained an “ongoing death investigation.”

The spokesperson added, “Both KCPD Detectives and the Platte County Prosecutor’s Office have been in touch with the deceased men’s families and remain in contact with them as the investigation unfolds.”

source: people.com